contrary
adj. opposite 相反的

cowboy
n. a person who looks after cattle in the western parts of the U. S. （美国西部的）牛仔

entertain
v. to invite people to one's home for a meal 招待

executive
adj. 执行的；负责的；行政的；an ～ director: 行政长官；此处指商会负责人

folk
n. people

gamble
n. a risky action or decision 冒险的事；赌博；take a ～ : to take an action that is risky hoping that it may succeed

gang
n. a group of persons who stick together, especially for criminal or other antisocial purposes

hitch
v. = hitchhike: to travel by asking drivers of passing cars for free rides 沿途搭车旅行

hitchhiker
n. a person who hitchhikes 沿途搭乘他人便车旅行的人

intrigue
v. to arouse the interest or curiosity 激起……好奇心

lowa
n. a state in the U. S. 衣阿华州

Jamestown
n. 詹姆斯敦（这里指田纳西州的一个城市）

journey
v. to travel

kin
n. （集合名词）relatives 亲戚

lumber-mill
n. a building where trees are cut up to make wood 锯木厂

lurk
v. to wait quietly and secretly in order to attack 埋伏以便伺机攻击

magnificent
adj. extremely good, beautiful or impressive 不平凡的；了不起的

Montana
n. a state in the U. S. 蒙大拿州

motto
n. a short statement used as a guide of behavior 座右铭

murderer
n. a person who unlawfully kills another person

Nebraska
n. a state in the U. S. 内布拉斯加州

New Orleans
n. a city in the U. S. 新奥尔良

North Carolina
n. a state in the U. S. 北卡罗来纳州

Oregon
n. a state in the U. S. 俄勒冈州

patriotic
adj. feeling or showing love, support and loyalty to one's country 爱国的

rapist
n. 强奸犯

readiness
n. willingness or eagerness to do sth.

renew
n. to find sth. again after it has been lost 重新恢复

revelation
n. sth. which is made known and was previously unknown 突然显示的事实

risk
v. to take an action, even though it might have unpleasant consequences 冒险

schedule
v. to arrange for sth. to be done; to plan that sth. will happen at a particular time

shabby
adj. in bad repair or condition 破旧不堪的

shelter
v. to provide a place to stay or rest
n. a place where you can stay or rest

skid
v. to suddenly slide sideways and get out of control 滑向一旁

solely
adv. only

stranded
adj. unable to move from the place where you are

symbol
n. a sign or object which represents an idea or value 象征

Tenn.
n. = Tennessee, a state in the U. S. 田纳西州

the Atlantic
n. 大西洋

the Pacific
n. 太平洋

thumb
n. 拇指

trucker
n. a truck driver

vehicle
n. a thing such as a car or bus etc. used for carrying people or things from one place to another 车辆

Wyoming
n. a state in the U. S. 怀俄明州

TEXT B

In Chelsea, Back to Sleep Suzanne Falter-Barns

Suzanne Falter-Barns is a novelist and essayist. Her novel, Doin' the Box Step, was published in 1992. Her essays have appeared in The New York Times, Adweek, and other periodicals. Her essay on a murder on the street outside her apartment in the Chelsea district of Manhattan appeared in the Times on November 25, 1989.

On a cool night recently, a woman was murdered in front of my apartment in Chelsea. She was sleeping in her car when someone—evidently trying to steal her car radio—was surprised by her, and slashed her throat with a knife.
The woman killed was only a few years older than I, and her photograph in the papers was familiar. Many neighbors had seen her coming and going from the Buddhist temple next door, and so she was one of us—another daily face you'd pass, unknown but still part of the surroundings. That she slept in her car was not even surprising, just another thing people do in New York. We regard it with the silence with which one sees everything in this city—the silence of blase acceptance.
Here is the core of the tragedy. An upstairs neighbor, wakened by her car horn, watched from his window as the stabbed woman staggered from her car, made her way up the steps of the temple and rattled the doorknob in vain. In the darkness, he could not see her profuse bleeding, but he could hear her speaking strangely, asking for what sounded like her mother. She was drunk, he assumed, or high, and he watched her make her way back to the car and drive away quickly. She died a few moments later.
Even at 4 o'clock in the morning, on a deserted block in Chelsea, what our neighbor saw did not seem unusual. He had the New York reaction of the 1980's, and assumed she was just another one of the city's huge corps of the deranged, the homeless, the addicted, the drunk. He didn't even consider going downstairs to help her; after all, how many dozens didn't he help just that day? To do so would have taken hours and dollars that cannot be spared, so my neighbor did what any of us would have done. He went back to sleep.
I cannot say I blame him. I was sitting in my living room while the murder took place right in front of my windows. In my sleeplessness, I was drinking hot milk and flipping through a travel magazine, steadfastly ignoring the weird murmurings of the girl outside. In fact, I didn't even think of getting up to see what might be wrong. Years of living in New York City had trained me: The distress you hear is nothing serious. It's only a drunk or a bum.
A few hours later, when the detectives questioned me, I was ashamed to admit what I had heard. Perhaps it wasn't her, but it probably was. If only I hadn't been so smug, if only I'd gone to the window, perhaps I could have done something. The doctor next door says no one could have saved her, but I tell myself I could have held her, or reassured her, or even tried to get a description of the assailant. At least she wouldn't have died so pitifully, ignored by her neighbors because they thought she was a drunk, when in fact, she was looking for help.
That this should be a normal reaction says something about our life here. What begins as compassion, when you first arrive, gets ground to dust by the daily barrage of people dressed in garbage bags, passed out in doorways, making loud, plaintive pitches on the subway or displaying their mutilated limbs in an attempt to get some change. The sheer numbers of these people exhaust the soul. To live here at all, you have to be callous.
The morning after the murder, I washed away the victim's bloodstains that covered the sidewalk; as I did, a stream of people in business clothes walked by, neatly picking their way past the stains, papers and briefcases tucked under their arms. No one seemed to notice or care what I was doing. No one asked what had happened. They averted their eye—avoiding the pain—keeping their mind on more important things. That someone died here was just another incident to file away, another fact of this strange place.